Quality Leadership Weblog :-)

The power of literacy. Too many Hoosiers don’t have tools needed to land good jobs, handle finances. Indianapolis Star, Sunday, June 29, 2008

Change at this level of magnitude typically has a low (less than 5%) success rate.  The illiteracy problem is not "new." 

Einstein commented that “Problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them.”  What new level of thinking is being used to reduce the illiteracy rate?

Identifying the gaps between actual and desired outcomes and raising visibility of the issue are common first steps but can also contribute to learned helplessness as attempts to bring about significant change result in little improvement as defined by the stakeholders.

How will you know, when will you know and who decides that change is resulting in improvement?

Iran Needs To Hear Firm No On Nukes
(Chicago Tribune)…Kay Bailey Hutchison, June 29, 2008

The Bush administration’s careful strategy of sanctions against Iran for its nuclear defiance has been on a glide slope of diminishing returns, and Iran has continued to plow ahead. By incrementally advancing its nuclear program while incrementally reducing its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran is creeping methodically toward a nuclear weapons capability.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) is chairman of the Senate Republican Policy Committee.

An Exodus From Iraq, (USA Today)…Brian J. Grim
June 30, 2008, Pg. 11

…The country’s religious minorities have been brutalized and driven away as a result of the Iraq war. In fact, when it comes to religious freedom, Iraq is not far ahead of notorious abusers such as Burma, Iran, North Korea and Sudan.

The Tragic End Of Bush’s North Korea Policy
(Wall Street Journal)…John R. Bolton, June 30, 2008
Pg. 13

Maskirovka – the Soviet dark art of denial, deception and disguise – is alive and well in Pyongyang, years after the Soviet Union disappeared. Unfortunately, the Bush administration appears not to have gotten the word.

….  the administration has accepted a North Korean "declaration" about its nuclear program that is narrowly limited, incomplete and almost certainly dishonest in material respects. In exchange, President Bush personally declared that North Korea is no longer a state sponsor of terrorism or an enemy of the United States. 

North Korea has consecutively broken every major agreement with the U.S. since the North’s creation. 

True Or False: We Need A Wartime President
(Newsweek)…Fareed Zakaria, July 7-14, 2008

…Life in America today is surprisingly normal for a country with troops in two battle zones. The country may be engaged in wars, but it is not at war.

We are in a struggle against Islamic extremism, but it is more like the cold war than a hot war—a long, mostly peacetime challenge in which a leader must be willing to use military power but also know when not to do so.

Perhaps the wisest American president during the cold war was Dwight Eisenhower, and his greatest virtues were those of balance, judgment and restraint. He knew we were in a contest with the Soviet Union, but—at a time when the rest of the country was vastly inflating the threat—he put it in considerable perspective. Eisenhower refused to follow the French into Vietnam or support the British at Suez. He turned down several requests for new weapons systems and missiles, and instead used defense dollars to build the interstate highway system and make other investments in improving America’s economic competitiveness. Those are the kinds of challenges that the next president truly needs to address.

In a sense, the warriors are pessimists. In the old days they were scared that communists would destroy America. Today they rail that Al Qaeda and Iran threaten our way of life. In fact, America is an extremely powerful country, with a unique and extraordinary set of strengths. The only way that position can truly be eroded is by its own actions and overreactions—by unwise and imprudent leadership. A good way to start correcting the errors of the past would be to recognize that we are not at war.

Answer: False

North Korea Gets U.S. Food Aid, (Seattle Times)…Burt Herman, Associated Press, June 30, 2008

A U.S. ship carrying thousands of tons of food aid has arrived in North Korea, after the communist nation agreed to expanded international assistance for its impoverished people, the U.N. food agency said today.

U.S. Is Said To Expand Covert Operations In Iran
(Washington Post)…Joby Warrick
The Bush administration told Congress last year of a secret plan to dramatically expand covert operations inside Iran as part of a long-running effort to destabilize the country’s ruling regime, according to a report published yesterday.

320,000 Graves To Be Dug For Enemies
(Washington Times)…Agence France-Presse
Iran is to dig 320,000 graves in border districts to allow for the burial of enemy soldiers in the event of any attack on its territory, a top commander said on Sunday.

Tehran Reportedly Reviewing Incentives
(Baltimore Sun)…Unattributed
Iran’s official IRNA news agency is reporting that officials are still reviewing an international package of economic incentives designed to get Tehran to curb its nuclear program.

Military Looking For Signs Of Attack, (Washington Times)…Shaun Waterman, United Press International

The U.S. military is looking for a contractor to patrol cyberspace, watching for warning signs of forthcoming terrorist attacks or other hostile activity on the Web.

"If someone wants to blow us up, we want to know about it," Robert Hembrook, the deputy intelligence chief of the U.S. Army´s Fifth Signal Command in Mannheim, Germany, told United Press International.

In a solicitation posted on the Web last week, the command said it was looking for a contractor to provide "Internet awareness services" to support "force protection," meaning the security of U.S. military installations and personnel.

Military Success In Iraq Masks Failures On Other Goals
(USA Today)…Editorial, July 1, 2008, Pg. 10

…Those are striking measures of military success, and they form the storyline of most importance to both Americans and to Iraqis. For good reason. Without reasonable security, little other success can be attained. But there is another storyline — one about the fragility of the recent successes — and it tells a deeper, more complex tale.

It was outlined most effectively last week by Congress’ investigative arm, the non-partisan Government Accountability Office, in a finely detailed report that got less attention than it deserved. Its central conclusion was more than a little bit worrisome: The U.S. lacks a convincing strategic plan for capitalizing on recent success, an echo of the lack of planning that turned victory into chaos after the invasion of Iraq five years ago.

The Pentagon and the State Department quickly disputed the GAO’s conclusion, but the report nevertheless points to challenging problems for which the GAO investigators, at least, did not see a cohesive, convincing response:  Continued violence… Iraqi competence … . Refugees ..  Al-Qaeda in Iraq. …  Iraqi government failings … .  Overlap among U.S. agencies … Worries about Sunnis. 

A Former Marine Discusses IT In Iraq
(Wall Street Journal)…Lee Gomes, July 1, 2008, Pg. B6

The U.S. military has been as enthusiastic about information technology as U.S. businesses have been, making computers, email and instant messaging part of everyday life for troops in Iraq. But the question of whether IT makes people better at what they do seems just as mixed a picture in combat as it is in the office.

The goal in war has always been to get as much intelligence to headquarters as quickly as possible, then to process it and get it back into the field. So, obviously, when you’re in the military and living in the Information Age, you want to take advantage of whatever technology is available. Radio is still the primary means of communication. With email, though, if anybody writes something, it’s a lot easier to read it later.